E3 2006: 10 Minutes with WarioWare

Just a few days prior to the Electronics Entertainment Expo 2006, Nintendo of America offered IGN an exclusive first look at some of its biggest Wii games. The brief preview of upcoming software was over almost before it began, and it both proved the console's potential and left many questions unanswered. IGN Wii's editor-in-chief Matt Casamassina has written a series of articles describing the approximate 10 minutes of play time he had with each of some of Nintendo's most important E3 Wii games. His impressions below:

As soon as Nintendo unveiled its plan for Wii, I thought to myself, "How long before WarioWare comes to the system?" I figured that it was an eventuality and it turns out that Nintendo had the same idea. WarioWare: Smooth Moves will be officially announced by the time you read this. I played a good 10-15 minutes of the game prior to E3 2006 and it's right on track to deliver the frantic twitch game experiences of its predecessors while simultaneously incorporating a new way to play.

Like Nintendo Sports Tennis or, for that matter, ExciteTruck, WarioWare: Smooth Moves foregoes the nunchuck attachment altogether and functions strictly with the Wii-mote. Smooth Moves will seem very familiar to anybody who has ever played a WarioWare title before. The title bombards you with a steady flow of mini-games, each more frantic and surreal than the next. What separates it from other WarioWare efforts, though, is the unique way in which the Wii-mote adds a layer of strategy and depth to the experience.

There are dozens upon dozens of different mini-games in Smooth Moves and there are a whopping 15 different ways to hold the Wii-mote as you play them - and that's part of the challenge and resulting fun.

Before each mini-game begins, a pre-screen directs you to hold the controller in a different manner. In some cases, you might need to grip it like a chauffer, in which case a driving challenge might ensue. In another case, you might need to grip it to your chest as though holding a sword, and in the challenge to follow you could be required to dice apart an object. The list goes on and on and on. You hold the Wii-mote like an umbrella to shake foam from a showering man; like a dumbbell to lift some weights; like a waiter to balance a ball into a hole; like a TV remote to stab a kiwi as it flies toward you; like a sketch artist to trace a triangle; like a boxer to crank a shredder; to your side to make a hula movement and more.

The project's visual presentation is more or less identical to its GCN granddaddy. The game does not run in widescreen mode, despite the fact that Zelda, Metroid and ExciteTruck do. A guitar riff plays between each mini-game and it increases in speed as you gain in difficulty.

All in all, our brief time with WarioWare is more than enough proof that it's going to be addictive outing that makes clever use of the Wii pointer. All of our movements were intuitively reflected on-screen with no hiccups in translation and by the time we had advanced more than a couple of mini-games in, we had completely forgotten we were using a new control method to play. The ultimate pick-up-and-play title is back and in very good form.